Every year in September Tokara holds an event called
Wine Made Art to showcase the release of their new vintage wines and we were
also celebrating 10 years of Tokara wines. The art exhibited is from the Marie
Stander School of Art and is a selection of paintings done not with
watercolours but with wine and very accomplished they were. The wine - donated
by Tokara has to be boiled down to produce an ink like consistency and is then
applied, often in many layers, to watercolour paper. Also showcased was the
food of Executive chef Richard Carstens and his team who served brilliant canapés
all evening . We were delighted to be invited . The exhibition this year was
"Celebrating 10 Years of Wine Made Art…" All the pictures will remain
on show in the Tokara gallery until January 2016.
Lynne chatting to Wilhelm
Kühn, Restaurant manager, and Executive Chef Richard Carstens.
Some of the wonderful canapés
Richard produced, These are scallops with mushrooms, topped with a herb
mayonnaise
It looked and tasted
like the best imported smoked salmon but in fact is excellent smoked trout from
the Du Toitskloof area. Served on crisp Banting type seed crackers.
Crab paté topped with
salmon caviar on crisp flaky pastry bases
Intense cheese biscuits
topped with a creamy cheese sauce and grated parmesan cheese, a cheesy
experience bar none
Oh-so-fresh oysters
served with a dollop of lime sorbet
Lynne’s favourite, prawn
tails on skewers with a garlic dipping sauce
Beautiful floral
displays with the art exhibition
Tea and wine: A Celebration of Friends by Maroli van der Merwe
More stunning flowers.
They all had a wonderful perfume that filled the gallery
Studying the pictures
The kitchen having a
short rest between preparing and serving canapés
Vegetarian sushi rolls
with something different - Richard put crisp and hot slices of radish in the
rolls and then coated the outside in sesame seeds. Something to copy at home.
Rick and Marie Stander listening
to the speeches
Aidan Morton, Tokara
viticulturalist, spoke fluently about the exhibition
Owner of Tokara GT Ferreira
He talked about how
quickly the last 10 years have gone since he bought the farm and the whole
experience of planting vines and then seeing the results 10 years on. Those
results were in our glasses and were extremely good
In the tasting room with
the roaring fire
Tasting the new vintage releases
of Tokara's premium Black label wines. We particularly enjoyed the crisp TOKARA
2014 Director’s Reserve White which is a Bordeaux-style white blend consisting
of 69% Sauvignon Blanc and 31% Semillon. There is also a 2015 Sauvignon Blanc
and a 2015 Chardonnay in the range, both excellent . The 2012 Director’s
Reserve Red is a classic barrel matured Bordeaux blend made to last years and a
2012 Reserve Collection spicy perfumed Syrah, a lovely food wine
The Odobey turret clock in the tasting room, loudly ticking off each minute. Made in the 19th century, it was restored by clockmaker Jacques Arzul
It is very relaxed with
good seating and the best works from the last 10 years were displayed in this room
Another amazing floral
display and above it a very interesting lamp with a mountain relief moulded
onto it and a star map inscribed onto the copper surface
Takuan and Christiane
von Arnim with Ueli Schmidt and Andy Zimmermann from Kapweine in Switzerland who were attending Cape wine:
The entrance way is
rather like Alice in Wonderland with this huge well lit sculpture of a tree,
all it needs is the Cheshire Cat
Looking through to the
gallery
Our transport home down
the N1. Tokara had laid on a bus for guests coming from Cape Town and we were
very grateful for it
Nearly in town. This is
where the motorway splits for people going to the Southern suburbs or into
central Cape Town
